Molecular genetics professor selected for prestigious Mercator Fellowship

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — John Carlson, professor of molecular genetics in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, recently was named Mercator Fellow and Visiting Professor at Georg-August University of Göttingen in Germany.

The award allows Carlson to serve as visiting professor for up to three months a year for three years in the Department of Forest Genetics and Forest Tree Breeding at the University of Göttingen. The fellowship is funded by a research grant from the German Research Foundation awarded to Oliver Gailing, head of the Department of Forest Genetics and Forest Tree Breeding at the University of Göttingen.

“I will assist with a project on genomic analysis of ecological speciation in the oak genus,” Carlson said. “I was asked to collaborate on this project because of my many years of experience using various DNA-based genetic marker systems.”

Carlson, director of the Schatz Center for Tree Molecular Genetics at Penn State, conducts research in the areas of genomics, conservation genetics and biotechnology. His current projects cover a wide range of topics, from sequencing the chestnut genome to soil metagenomics of short rotation biomass crops.

“The Mercator Fellowship is much appreciated, especially as I near retirement,” he said. “It recognizes the contributions that my students and colleagues in the Schatz Center have made in the development and application of genomics resources for trees.”